Canadian fire officials battling wildfires in Alberta warned the only thing that could stop the blaze was a lot of rain. The latest damage estimates indicate that the Fort McMurray fire could cost insurance companies around C$9 billion ($7 billion).

On Thursday, the enormous fire that had already destroyed hundreds of homes and encircled a city and several communities was picked up by 70 kilometer-per-hour (44mph) winds and spread to 85,000 hectares.

The most severe part of the roaring front moved south of Fort McMurray, with no signs of stopping.

Mar

21

2016

Monday’s cold was uncharacteristic for the date, according to National Weather Service records.

The temperature reached 66 degrees early Monday morning in Vero Beach, but the cold spell moved in at daybreak, lowering the temperature from 61 at 6 a.m. to 55 at sunrise. Meteorologists said the temperature topped out at 62 degrees in the afternoon. Strong winds, gusting to 25 mph, kept blowing in cold air from the north.

Mar

03

2016

Arctic sea ice is limping toward its seasonal peak, hitting a record low for the month of February on the heels of another record set just the month before.

The region — which acts as the northern hemisphere’s refrigerator — was missing a chunk of ice measuring about 448,000 square miles, compared to the 1981-2010 long-term average, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

Mar

01

2016

Vietnam is suffering its worst drought in nearly a century with salinization hitting farmers especially hard in the crucial southern Mekong delta, experts said Monday. “The water level of the Mekong River has gone down to its lowest level since 1926, leading to the worst drought and salinisation there,” Nguyen Van Tinh, deputy head of the hydraulics department under the Ministry of Agriculture, told AFP.

Mar

01

2016

After a promising start to winter, California’s snowpack has shrunk to below-average levels, causing state water officials to redouble their calls for water conservation.

On Tuesday, the statewide snowpack stood at only 83% of average for the day, a result the California Department of Water Resources blamed on fall and winter seasons that have brought only “moderate precipitation” and “relatively warm temperatures.”

Feb

22

2016

There’s a still in the air – and it is bad news for North America’s wind turbines.

Last year saw the lowest average wind speeds in half a century across much of North America. There were long periods of motionless air across most of the Great Plains and the West, stretching through to Texas and Florida, and from Mexico to Canada.

Feb

22

2016

Workers scrambled to reach hard-hit outer islands in Fiji on Monday to fully assess the scope of the devastating cyclone that struck the Pacific Island nation over the weekend, killing at least 20 people.

Tropical Cyclone Winston, which lashed Fiji on Saturday night, is the most powerful storm on record in the Southern Hemisphere, authorities said.